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tait@ tsts @anni @fitta ARZA B. KEITH, OF N ORTH BRIDGEWATER, AND T. K.RED, OF BRIDGEWATER, MASSACHUSETTS.

Letters Patent No. 64,228 dated, April 30, 1867.

IMPROVEMENT IN CUTTING OUT LEATHER.

TO ALL WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:

`:Be it known that we, ARZA B. KEITH, of North Bridgewater, and T. K.REED, of East Bridgewater, all in the county of Plymouth, and State ofMassachusetts, have invented an Improvement in Cutting vOut Leather; andwe do hereby declare that the following, taken in connection with thedrawings which accompany and form part of this specification, is adescription of our invention sufhcient to enable those skilled in theart to practise it.

This invention is applicable in boot and shoe factories, wherever rim orhoop knives or cutters, sometimes technically, dies, are 'used to cutout of a side of leather, or a skin, or a strip of either, a shapedsole, a vamp, or a counter, or other piece, the perimeter of which isentirely formed by one cut. It has been customary to use such cutters byplacing them on the leather and then striking a heavy blow with a malletor hammer; but this process is very laborious and rapidly deterioratesthe cutters so used.

Our invention consists, primarily,'in a process or mode of-operation forcutting out pieces of leather, the perimeters of which are formed by onecut. Said process is found in making use of hoops or continuous knives,provided with vertical handles, in connection with a press, so that theknives may, by the hand of the operator, be placed anywhere, as desired,on the surface of the leather, which rests on the bed of the press, andmay be held and steadied there by the hand during the vcutting operationwithout the least danger to the operator, the

handles of the knives being of such length as to afford sulcient roomfor the hand between the follower of the press and the tops of theknives when the follower is in its nearest position to the bed of thepress.- The bed and follower of the press are best made of considerablearea, though the follower may be of less size than the bed, as thehandles of the cutters are centrally located upon them.

In the practice of. our process the area of the bed should not be solarge as to prevent the operator from easily reaching from one side all-parts thereof. The position of the leather. may be shifted upon the bedso as to bring thereupon those parts which have overhung the bed. Incutting out leather ny our process, the operator has a bench or tablebeside him, on which he has his handled hoop-cutters, of such differentsizes and forms as he may desire to make use of. The leather being thenproperly located on the bed of the press, a cutter is taken and placedon the leather where it is desired to cut out a piece, the location ofthe cutter being such that when the operator causes the follower todescend it will abut upon the handle of the cutter and-will drive itsedge through the leather, and thus, by moving the cutter and the leatherwhen necessary, and changing the cutters when desired, and causingmovements of the follower, the leather is cut as and where desired, withthe least possible wear or vdamage of the cutters, and with so littlecall for muscular exertion on the part of the operator that women orchildren may take the place of strong men. The drawings illustratingthis process show, inl Figure I, in side elevation, a press, which wefind well adapted to its practice; and 1n Figure 2 a front end viewthereof.

a is the frame of the press, b thebed, and c the follower, which isattached to a slide, d, which is moved vertically in the ways e wheneverthe eocentricfon the shaft g is rotated. The bed is faced with suitablesoft material, preferably close hard wood with the grain vertical, so asto save the edges of the cutters from harm as they are forced throughthc leather upon or into the material of the hed; and a screwadjustment, as seen at h, is provided, by which the face of the bed canbe adjusted relatively to the lower face of the follower, so that whenthis is in its lowest position, the distance between the Ysaid facesshall be equal to the distance from Ythe edges of the cutters to thetops of their handles. A stud, z', is fixed in the rear of the frame,Von which stud are placed, so as to rotate freely thereon, the pinion j,and one part of afriction-coupling arrangement thereon, and thebelt-pulley 7c, and theother part of said friction-clutch. By means of'the yoke l, lever m, link n, and bent treadle-lever o, theoperator can,by depressing lever o, by foot, slide pulley .7c towards pinions j, sothat by the contact of the two parts of the friction-coupling therotation of pulley 7c will be communicated to pinion j, which meshesinto and rotates the gearp and shaft g on which said gear is xed. Whenthe treadle o is released from the foot of the operator the spring ttends, by its contraction, to restore the treadlc toits normal position,and when the treadle is moved by the spring the parts ofthe'friction-conpling will vbe Sundered by movement of the pulley coutward on stud z'. There is a lever, q, pivoted to the frame, one endof which has an adjustable connection to the link n, the other endextending to a flange, 1', fixed on shaft g. In the face ot' said ilangethere is a recess formed, as seen at s, with inclined sides. The purposeof this lever and the flange with its recess, as arranged and connected,is to cause the follower Ato stop automatically at the highest point of'its movement, which result is brought about as follows: The arrangementof parts is such that when the follower is fully raised the recess inthe flange is opposite the upperk end of lever where the spring t,acting through the lever o and link n, keeps it, so that said lever gacts as a stop to prevent accidental movementV of the follower.

But when the treadle is depressed by the foot, then, as pulley c isbrought toward flange r, the upper end of lever g is thrown outward fromthe faceof said lange, and as shaft g begins to rotate the yupperend oflever g, hea-ring against the face of the ange r, keeps the parts of thefriction-coupling in contact, even after thelfoot of the operator 'isreleased from the treadle, and this condition of things remains till, inthe rotation of"l the flange, the recess therein comes opposite theaforesaid end of lever g, when the contraction of spring t will at oncecause the entry of the upper end of g into said recess, moving thepulley lc outward at the saine instant and releasing the parts of thefriction-coupling from contact.

It is in the combination of the parts, when arranged substantially asdescribed, by which movement of the follower is arrested automatically,that Athe second part of our invention consists'.

We claim the described process of press cutting with handle-dies,substantially as described.

Also, the combination, with a treedle-lever, of a. stop-lever and a,friction-coupling, arranged to operatesub stantially as described.

ARZA B, KEITH,

T. K. REED. Witnesses:

J. B. CROSBY, F. GOULD.

